


Where We Started

by Rosage



Category: The Arcana (Visual Novel)
Genre: Mutual Pining, Other, Post-Canon
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-09
Updated: 2019-02-09
Packaged: 2019-10-24 19:09:54
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,649
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17709911
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rosage/pseuds/Rosage
Summary: An education project has Asra and Julian working together in the palace library for the first time in years. They’re determined not to make it end like old times.





	Where We Started

**Author's Note:**

> The vaguely-referenced Carrow belongs to Fayery. He and Muriel are very happy together, and Asra is thrilled.

Asra is scanning a tome of fire spells when Nadia enters the library, the steady strength of her aura giving her away.

“Do not let me interrupt,” she says. “I just thought to check on how everything is coming along. Oh, my.” She stops short, arms crossed as she surveys their workspace. “Do neither of you know the definition of ‘organize?’”

“Hear that, Ilya?”

Ilya shoots Asra a look over the teetering piles on his desk. “These are organized. What do you call that?” He points at the heaps of books scattered around Asra’s feet, near the pile of pillows he’s neglecting.

“Um, a work in progress? Sorry, Nadi. I promise it’ll look better when we’re done.”

“Oh, er, of course he’s right, Countess.”

Her arms drop, her face softening as it usually does at their puppy eyes. “Well, I don’t suppose it matters how the piles look, so long as you decide which ones to pull out. And leave them undamaged, of course.”

“That means no writing in them,” Asra reminds Ilya.

“Er, right.” He scratches his head and mutters, “Don’t know how else I’m supposed to make heads or tails of anything.”

“How is everything on your end, Nadi?”

“Most of my projects are causing no end of headaches, but in regards to the literacy program, Portia is doing an excellent job of motivating the citizens to get involved.” Nadia’s face radiates with a pride that Ilya mirrors. It makes Asra smile just from the reflection. “Her own story of learning to read is quite inspiring, though she’s left out the part about practicing at my bedside. It seems she’s embellished it with a tale of a pirate traveling to spread literacy.”

“By your bedside?” The way Asra draws out the word brings a flush to Nadia’s cheeks.

“Yes. Well. I shall leave the telling of her tale to her, and you to your business.” Nadia leaves as efficiently as she does anything, with a trail of flowing skirts and lavender.

Asra bops Ilya on the shoulder with a book. “Your sister’s going to be a princess.”

“All sisters are princesses, Asra.” Ilya returns to the shelves to resume his search. Asra watches those long, gloved fingers glide over the spines until he has to tear his gaze away. “You know, it’s funny, I used to tell her bedtime stories about princesses getting into sword fights until the day of their grand wedding.”

“Guess you’re prophetic after all.”

“Wait, really?”

“Nah, describing Nadi when you’re mocking up someone’s dream spouse isn’t exactly hard. It sounds like something one of the more bogus fortune-tellers in the marketplace would say. ‘Ooh, I see everything now, you’re arm-in-arm with someone smart, beautiful, and talented… Based on the clothes, they must be royalty… Look, now they’re proposing...’”

Asra’s gesticulations could put Ilya to shame. When his arms settle, Ilya slips a hand in the crook of his elbow and leans down, his mouth level with Asra’s temple. “Look at this, I must have all the luck.”

“Oh, is royalty proposing to you?”

“You know what I meant.” His lips ghost Asra’s forehead, making the shell of Asra’s heart thump. Untangling their arms, Ilya slips away to his desk, where he disappears behind his stacks of books before Asra can form a rebuttal.

Asra slides a book off the shelf and flips through it without reading. These days he finds himself wishing Ilya had _less_ restraint, even if he developed some for Asra’s sake. As appreciative as Asra is, the imprints of his magic remain in years-old portals, recalling memories he doesn’t want. He wants new ones, lighter ones, with Ilya’s desk beneath his thighs, and Ilya—

His thumb tears a page. He stares at it dully, his face hot at both his thoughts and his carelessness. As he tries to fix it with a quick spell, he notices the planar diagrams illustrated in the book. He whistles. He doesn’t know how he missed this one before, but his immediate instinct is to stuff it in his bag—not to keep forever, just until he can hide deep enough in the garden maze that he won’t be interrupted.

“What’s so, ah, impressive?”

Though Asra manages not to jump at Ilya’s voice over his shoulder, he shuts the book. “You know, just some creepy dark magic.”

Predictably, that makes Ilya back up a step. “You—you can’t fool me. You told me that some of those books are just for extra strength cleaning remedies, and the like.”

The one time it’s actually dangerous. _Figures_. Asra sets the book in the pile to keep locked away. “Exactly, Ilya. It’s so that evil cleaning staff can polish the palace floors so well you slip.”

That actually makes Ilya shudder. “I, uh, don’t need help with that, thanks.” Again he returns to his medical textbooks. He probably won’t last long before he has to wander over again, or pace the library and chat up the other specialists sorting through their assigned sections. Luckily for Asra, he hasn’t bumped into them much himself, as the books on foraging for ingredients and brewing natural remedies stitch together the magical and medical sections like a zigzagging seam.

The thought makes Asra smile until he comes across another book about travelling to forbidden planes. This time he doesn’t have to fight so hard against that old urge. Not only is he past being desperate enough to seek such magic, but the days of having to infiltrate the palace to learn are gone, too. As soon as Nadia set projects in motion to keep the city fed and above water, she turned her attention to the palace’s heaps of hoarded knowledge. She plans to open the library to the public as soon as all knowledge too dangerous or outdated is sorted out and restricted.

As the sun slides lower down the wall-length windows, and he has to read by magical light, Asra’s attention slips in the hazy pink air. “I’d better head home.”

“You mind if I, uh, move a few of those so nobody trips?”

It takes a moment for Asra to register what Ilya is offering, not the offer he had braced himself for. He looks down at the trail of books from his feet to the middle of the floor. “Oh. Sure. Just be careful with the tomes on magical jungles, they bite.”

He leaves Ilya sputtering behind him.

* * *

If one day it’s Ilya’s turn to constantly poke over his shoulder, the next day, it’s Asra’s. It’s easier than pretending not to notice Ilya’s longing looks burn the back of his neck, disrupting his watery aura. They’re doing the city enough of a service to deserve some indulgence, not that Ilya would see it that way, but Asra spent so long unable to give him what he wanted that he’s not sure how to now.

He compromises by hovering, half-working, behind Ilya’s desk. The minty concoctions Ilya makes to clean his hair and mouth don’t cover for his sweat, which the library itself usually masks with dust and aged parchment. Asra fingers the ivy climbing up the wall to keep from thinking of trailing down Ilya’s back.

“Dunno about dangerous, but none of this is scientifically accurate enough to release to the public,” Ilya says. “It’s a bunch of mumbo jumbo theories about plants or potions that could cure anything. I always scoffed at the idea. Spending a lifetime searching for some illusive miracle instead of doing real work.”

Asra ponders what Ilya would think of his dad’s work before deciding his dad doesn’t deserve that. Ilya’s fingers press at his throat.

“Then I became a walking panacea,” he continues. “Barely tested any other methods during those three years, and now I’m back where I started. Ironic, hm?”

“Do you really think you’re where you started, Ilya?” Asra makes the suggestion softly, but he tenses as he waits for Ilya’s reply.

“I sure hope not. Even I have to admit leeches have their limits, especially after my body did, well, all that.”

“I see.” Asra manages to sound unaffected, though internally he has to laugh at himself. Since when is Ilya the more practical of the two of them?

What is he expecting?

“You, uh, are you all right? That’s quite a lot of sighing.”

Jerking his head at Ilya’s voice, Asra finds Ilya frowning at him. Oh. Not so unaffected. “Yeah, just can’t believe how much time some of these older magicians spent searching for flying leeches.”

“ _Flying leeches_? Wait, you’re pulling my leg again.”

“No, no—see, they’re called mosquitoes—”

“There’s no medical use for mosquitoes.” Ilya runs a hand through his hair, pulling his bangs away from the red sclera that still makes Asra go cold. “Listen, it’s, it’s ok if you don’t want to talk about whatever’s, ah, whatever might be wrong, but I’m here if you want to. You know I’m here, right?”

Looking over his shoulder puts Ilya inches from Asra’s face, his gaze intense enough to make Asra want to run. Another part of him feels pulled by the magnetism that brings excitement into Ilya’s orbit, as well as by a deeper instinct to test the limits of what he’s offering. Still another part thinks he should have picked something Ilya would find more believable, like unicorns. Idly he looks down at the book he has balanced on Ilya’s desk. The page has some basic remedies for poor sleep, nothing to pretend to be worked up about, though they could both use it.

He tucks the book under his arm and steps away. “Yeah. Thanks, Ilya.”

* * *

Other than a few fortune-telling appointments, the shop is temporarily closed, with Carrow safe in the woods and Asra at the palace. Asra returns every night anyway, even though Nadia offered a room. He’ll always be at home there, wrapped in Faust and starry blankets and incense lit by the salamander.

It grows colder as June creeps into July. The memory of his birthday and the anticipation of Nadia’s birthday warm him, alone in a bed he used to share, resolutely thinking of laughing with friends rather than other fancies.

There was a time when a whole day stuck inside the library would have meant enough of Ilya’s voice, but that was when the plague weighed heavily enough to suffocate them. The freedom lets him breathe. He wonders what it would take to be light enough to float.

* * *

The library looks messier than ever, a necessary stage before things improve, Ilya assures Nadia. It’s not empty smooth talk; Asra feels the progress with each book, each specialization a young mage might need to learn. He daydreams about how he’d teach a few students, bright children driven to hide under bridges or behind shops, making images appear in the water or ivy climb up the walls without guidance. Children that could do better than make deals with tyrants or arcane tricksters.

He glances at Ilya, who’s answering someone’s question about an amputation textbook. Whatever Asra thinks of how Ilya handled Carrow’s apprenticeship, as he is now, he could do well with students. Still, even if they continue with this project, there’s no way magical and medical lessons would be conducted in the same place.    

That’s fine; it’s not like Ilya is around when Asra runs the shop, or like Asra ever spent time at Ilya’s old clinic. Nonetheless, Asra’s pulse quickens, and the piles around him suddenly feel too chaotic. He doesn’t quite pull himself together before the sunset bathes Ilya’s shoulders in its usual warning orange.

“Let’s go for a walk,” Asra says. Ilya scans his desk; unlike Asra, he doesn’t go home until well into the night, or at all, if the empty coffee pot on his desk in the morning is any indication.

“I guess all of this will still be here.” He seems to sense Asra’s restlessness, as he doesn’t even stop to pull on his coats.

Even in winter, the palace gardens are lush, a combination of the climate and magic in some palace gardeners’ fingertips. Asra admires splashes of purple and white from the heather and pansies, prompting Ilya to tuck a pansy behind Asra’s ear.

“Stealing from the palace?” Asra asks with a false gasp. Ilya’s eyebrows waggle.

“I’m excellent at evading guards.”

“Take me somewhere secretive, then.”

It’s even cooler in the shade of the trees they duck between. Moss-covered branches waggle twiggy fingers at Asra; he waves back, then steps closer to Ilya for warmth, brushing his knuckles against the back of Ilya’s hand. Ilya tenses without pulling away. After a moment, he slips his hand loosely in Asra’s. They don’t quite fit, Ilya’s gloves slippery against Asra’s thin fingers, but they stay that way while breathing in the sandalwood.

“Is this all right?” Ilya asks. “We both know I’ve got a tendency to, ah, get carried away, and I don’t want—I’ve been trying—”

Asra releases Ilya’s hand. “Stop trying.”

Whatever Ilya starts to say breaks off when Asra reaches for him, watching for a sign of rejection that doesn’t come. He grabs Ilya’s lapels, and Ilya’s mask breaks, his throat bobbing.

“Then what do you want me to do?” he whispers, low and desperate. It hits Asra that his fists are trembling against Ilya’s chest. He loosens his grip, letting his hands drop to hover around Ilya’s abdomen.

“I want you to tell me what you want. If that’s…” He laughs, once, drily. “If that’s something you want to do.”

Shock and confusion split Ilya’s face. “You know I’d do anything for you.”

“That’s not what I asked.”

Ilya licks his lips. “I’m not, I’m not supposed to…”

“Since when has either of us ever done what we’re supposed to?”

“Thought I’d change things up.”

“You’re allowed to ask for things, Ilya, just like I’m allowed to say no.” His hands climb again, this time to cradle Ilya’s jaw. “What do you want?”

Tentatively, Ilya holds Asra’s waist, like he’s trying to keep them rooted. “A lot of things, if I’m honest.”

“Tell me some.”

Ilya takes a shaky breath. “I want this education project Nadia’s starting to get off the ground. And the ones to help the flooded district and end hunger, for that matter.” His gaze becomes unfocused, traveling to some point over Asra’s head. “I want a better way to heal. One without leeches or giant bird men. And I want the people I care for to be happy.” He meets Asra’s eyes again with sudden sharp focus.

“What do you want for yourself, Ilya?”

“For myself?”

“Mhm.” His thumbs rub circles against Ilya’s flushed skin. “There must be something.”

“I, I mean, you know.”

“Tell me.”

“I want you.”

Asra doesn’t give him a chance to walk it back. Taking just enough care not to get either of their eyes poked out, he presses Ilya against a tree trunk with a hand on his chest, the other still stroking his face. Their mouths never quite fit—Ilya’s neck cranking down while Asra stands on his toes, Ilya’s thin lips yielding to his—but they stay sealed together, sharing warm tea-and-coffee breaths. It’s too raw for Asra to float. Instead, he finally finds his ground, anchored by Ilya’s hands sliding up his sides to clutch the back of his shirt.

Dizziness sets in when they part, almost still stuck together. “God, Asra, god, I want…” Nerves peak through the desire clouding Ilya’s eyes. “I don’t want to be bad for you.”

“So don’t.” At Ilya’s doubtful look, Asra caresses his cheek. “People can learn. No matter what you think, you’re not back where you started. _We’re_ not.”

Ilya finally smiles as he adjusts the flower behind Asra’s ear. The pressure in Asra’s chest lightens. “I might need a few more lessons,” Ilya says with a grin, and Asra is happy to indulge.

 


End file.
